Ready for the rescue job: Salman Khurshid

The new law minister, Salman Khurshid, knows what he is in for: the job of building a bridge between hard-hitting courts and a cornered government.

Soon after being sworn in, the former lecturer in law at Trinity College, Oxford, told HT: “We will go to the courts in the spirit cooperation.”

Taking charge just when the country’s top law officer, solicitor-general Gopal Subramanium, quit office in a huff, Khurshid said he would “find out what went wrong” and did not rule out talking to him.

Khurshid said his priorities aren’t very different for his predecessor’s, but disagreed that it is one about “defending” the government in courts of law, despite the judiciary ticking off the government several times over.

“It’s not about defending the government. To defend would mean as if we are accused of something. It’s all about simply representing the government’s points of view adequately,” the law minister said, splitting some legal hairs.

Khurshid, who studied law at St. Edmund Hall, Oxford, every law minister would always have to work for “fast and affordable” justice.

Asked how he would handle the scandal over second-generation (2G) telecom licences, whose probe is being monitored by the Supreme Court, Khurshid said: “We will have to find a better way of communicating to the courts.”

“The speaking voice of the courts and the speaking voice of the government may appear to be different. My duty will be to ensure they are understood well,” Khurshid added.